Real Estate News

File under under “Things are much different here.”

Tenant annoys landlord

An angry tenant admitted to uttering obscene words at his landlord last year.

Vimal Singh told the court he was guilty of the offence as the magistrate was getting ready to make arrest orders against the witnesses.

Mr Singh was charged with annoying any person.

The police prosecution informed the court that summons for the two witnesses, including one who was a police constable, had been served last October.

The court was told the witnesses had failed to appear and the prosecution made an application for a bench warrant for the witnesses. Mr Singh told the court there was no need to arrest the two men because he committed the crime.

The court asked him if he was doing on his own will. He responded in the affirmative.

The court heard the incident occurred when the landlord told Mr Singh, who was partying with two women at his flat in Samabula, that partying was not allowed.

In mitigation, Mr Singh said he was 41 years old and self-employed earning around $60 a day.

He told the court he was paying rent for the flat and felt his landlord had ridiculed him in front of his guests.

Mr Singh will be sentenced next Tuesday.

“In conclusion, the reason I remain bearish on real estate is that when the noise is filtered out, the market has only survived by means of an unprecedented amount of intervention.  This dependency is not only unhealthy, its stimulating effect is now fading.  If real estate prices cease to appreciate, the market will suffer, same as it did when the sub-prime bubble burst in 2006/2007.”

Want more doom and gloom?  Read the rest here.

H/T to zerohedge.com

Seems some apartment communities are going to extremes in the war on dog poop.  The Jacksonville Daily News reports that:

“When the registry is complete, the DNA of any dog waste found on the property will be tested and matched to the registered dogs, according to information from the company. The matching owner will then be fined.”

Read the rest of the story here.

The Wall Street Journal reports:

Demand for rental housing continues to climb more than four years after the recession, pushing up rents and cutting into Americans’ disposable income.

After peaking at just above 11% in 2009, rental vacancy has fallen sharply in the wake of the housing collapse and recession. That reflects families flocking to rentals after losing their homes to foreclosure, being blocked from obtaining a mortgage due to tighter lending standards or simply concluding that buying is too risky.

The higher demand and tighter supply of units are enabling landlords to raise prices. The median asking rent for vacant units in October through December was $746, up 3% from $724 a year earlier.

h/t to:  Economicpolicyjournal.com

Looks like house flipping is making a comeback.   According to Realtytrac.com:

The average gross profit for a home flip — the difference between the flipped price and the price the flipper purchased the property for — was $58,081 for all U.S. homes flipped in 2013, up from an average gross profit of $45,759 in 2012. The average gross profit for homes flipped in the fourth quarter was $62,761, up from $52,746 in the fourth quarter of 2012.

Let’s just hope we don’t forget what happened the last time (in 2006 or so) we got so excited about flipping houses.

Unless you want your mug shot posted all over the news too!

Landlord forged judge’s signature to evict Cortlandt tenant, police say

Here is an interesting story on where the super rich have been investing in real estate.  Seems they have been increasing their holdings quite a bit in recent years.

h/t to EconomicPolicyJournal.com

According to landlord Steve Fishman,

“People have mixed views of Axl Rose, but as a landlord, I loved him. If he ever needs a recommendation, I’ll happily write: Quiet, undemanding, and pays his rent.”

Read more here.

There is some good news and some bad news out there for landlords recently.

Let’s look at the good news first.

The rent is going up. 

According to an article in USA Today

Rents will increase 3.1% nationally next year, about the same as this year, apartment market researcher Axiometrics says.

Meanwhile, researcher Reis sees rents rising an average of 3.3% in 2014.

Lots of folks are still looking to rent, while the supply of rental housing remains tight.  Look for more multi-family construction in 2014.

On the bad side, some tenants may not be able to pay these increased rents.  A recent study by Harvard University notes that:

the number of renters paying more than 30 percent of income for housing (the traditional measure of affordability)reached another high in 2012. Excessive housing costs strained the budgets of more than half of all renters, or 21.1 million households—a slight increase from the year before.

Lots of factors come into play here.  But look for a continued squeeze on renters in 2014.